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Topic: Oxalic Acid Trickling (Read 5147 times)

So i treated my hives a few days ago with the OA trickle method as i had quite a bad mite prob. I think it is working really well as i had a huge mite drop. The application was really easy and the bees seemed unaffected by it-business as usual about the hive. I am wondering how i proceed after this though-if i still have a large mite count is it safe to re-treat in the same manner? Will a few PS shakes after do? We just started to get a late heat wave tmps in the 70's :-\

bberry. You MAY NOT retreat again with the oxalic acid treatment when it is done as a syrup trickle. It is only ALLOWED once per year. I have read this over and over. DO not treat again until next fall if you have to. I don't even think that you should do any more further treatments until spring. Leave the bees alone for the wintertime rest.

You will see by the figures in the chart that Finsky posted, the mites will keep falling for several weeks. You can probably bet your bottom dollar that your mite levels will be extremely low, even perhaps non-existent after this time. Oxalic acid syrup trickling is excellent mite controls, done, when you have, when there is no brood present in the hives. Have a wonderful day, best of this life. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

I got the Ace brand Wood Bleach-99.9 % OA at Ace hardware for $7.49 Thank you Cindi for clerifying the one treatment-maybe i was reading wrong but it was not clear to me. the hives are doing great and have seemed to suffer not at all from this form of treatment.

Bberry, you live in California. You should look into hives and take away brood frames if you have them. Then kill brood in freezer and let bees clean combs. Faster way is to let birds pick up brood from combs after killing. Swarm of major tits or magpie clean the frame in couple of hours.

Bberry. By the way, Finsky is correct with what he is saying. If you had brood in the hives when you trickled they will be damaged/dead. To make it easier for the bees, kill the brood quickly by freezing (if you can). I don't know how long it takes for oxalic acid trickling to kill the brood, but it does, and maybe it takes some time, so quick freezing will speed up the process. Let us know how things continue to work out, we are all interested. Have a great and wonderful day. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Corraborating what Finsky says. That is why to kill the brood, there are mites in "them thar hills", hiding, destroying baby bees, to emerge, latch onto an adult and then.......

In my understanding of the mite babies. If you see 1 mite on a bee, you can know that the mites in the cells will be 10-fold of this.

One mite means means 10 in cells. Two mites means 20 mites in cells. Three mites means 30 in cells. These are only approximations, but take it from there, do a little bit of math, and you see how colonies can become over run in no time at all. Mites are serious, and are one of the worst plagues of the bees in these days. Sounds like, "here we go again, time for learning and listening", but yes, here we go again, learning, and learning more. Have a wonderful and greatest of this day on our earth. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Ok thought i'd update and seek some opinions. So the mite drop was great success-checked the hive thoroughly the other day and saw no mites anywhere-there were a couple on the bottom board. What i did see is that the empty brood cells are now full of eggs. We are having pretty warm weather here and i guess the queen is getting the green light to lay again. Will the eggs be effected by the OA treatment from before?Also as i was going frame by frame doing an inspec. i noticed a nice plump queen cell that i had not noticed before??? This hive has been really struggling the last few months so maybe they...? If they superceded the queen is this maybe why the new queen is laying? Spotted the queen(who has been elusive the entire season) and she seemed like a diff queen-very fat and larger than the queen i remember from way back in spring. Not really sure if i should be optimistic that they have a chance for a better queen or worried or don't worry cuz they did it already no matter how i feel about it :)

But I understand that powdered sugar is not intended to kill, just to knock off. Oh yeah...and feed the ants ;)

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Everyone said it couldn't be done. But he with a chuckle replied, "I won't be one to say it is so, until I give it a try." So he buckled right in with a trace of a grin. If he had a worry he hid it and he started to sing as he tackled that thing that couldn't be done, and he did it. (unknown)